Denise Mina: Exile

Cammy had all the equipment: he was tall and slim and blond but nature had played a cruel joke and made him an idiot. He smeared his fringe into a spiky comb on his forehead, wore a football top over straight-leg denims and had a recurring spot on the back of his neck that required urgent medical attention. Intimidated by the grand surroundings, he decided that Maureen and Liam were massively over-privileged parasites. He asked Liam whether his daddy had left him the house and Liam, pissed and unaware of the accusatory tone, laughed like a drain and said, yeah, that was right, his da gave it to him. Then Leslie took off her biker's jacket. Liam took in her change of style and asked why she was dressed like a whores' shop steward. Leslie's offense was lost in the memory of the night because Liam went on to greater glories. He chucked Maggie twenty minutes before the bells, saying she was too good for him, too good, and anyway, he was still in love with Lynn. Lynn heard him and was furious, said he'd made her look like a scheming cow, and she told Maggie that she'd never go out with him again. Unconsoled, Maggie locked herself in the only functioning toilet, causing a fifteen-minute queue and an inch of urine in the back garden.

Half the party saw in the new century waiting in a queue with their legs crossed.

Leslie and Cammy left Liam's Hogmanay party at one o'clock, a gesture with the same social connotations as a slap in the face with a dueling glove. At the door on the way out Cammy went to the trouble of telling Maureen that he wished they'd gone somewhere else. She said she wished he had too.

Maureen knew she must have done things wrong, that Leslie wouldn't treat her like a prick without justification, but she couldn't think her way through a day at work, much less six months of casual comments. She suspected that Leslie was disappointed and embarrassed by her performance at the shelter. Their friendship was dying and Maureen was too distracted by the past to make it right.

They were on the edge of the city center, in what used to be one of the busiest docks in Britain. The area had withered, the houses were run-down and the few shops were transient and dilapidated. Leslie parked the bike around the corner, out of sight of the I so that she could drink and drive without being reported. She kicked down the stand, bending down to chain the bike to a lamppost, leaving Maureen standing alone on the pavement.

Misty, unforgiving rain fluttered nervously around the head of the streetlights. Across the busy road stood a row of tenements with a twenty-four-hour grocer's on the corner. A huge gray concrete housing scheme loomed above the roof, the little square windows framed with cheap curtains. Designed as a series of reclining rectangles, the flats zigzagged along a straight line, joined end to end by lift shafts, like a futuristic city wall peopled by a plebiscite who could be spared in the event of an attack. The wall blocked the wild south wind from the street and squally vortexes had formed in the vacuum, sweeping the litter back and forth. On fine summer evenings plastic bags hovered twenty feet above the tenement for hours at a time, trapped in updrafts and crosswinds. Maureen flapped the skirt of her coat open and shut, trying to shake off the worst of the weather.

"Is that a new coat?" asked Leslie.

Maureen nodded.

"Nice," said Leslie. "Douglas's money?"

"Yeah." Maureen smiled. "From rags to bigger rags."

Leslie blanked her and put the helmets in the luggage box, clipped the padlock shut and led Maureen round the corner. They opened the door and stepped into the Driftwood restaurant, leaving the damp night behind them.

The Driftwood looked like a lifelong dream swallowing a redundancy check. It was a tiny room with big windows onto the dirty street, little tables covered in wax cloth and candles in Perrier bottles. It served tempting fusion food but charged next to nothing because it was in exactly the wrong place. Maureen and Leslie were the only paying customers. A chef in a T-shirt and checked trousers sat at a table near the bar, reading a tabloid and eating a bowl of soup. A pretty blond waitress fluttered across the floor, whipping the menus from behind the bar as she came towards them. "For two?"

"Yes, please," said Maureen.

She sat them at a table by the window. The convection heaters were blowing as hard as they could but Maureen and Leslie had to keep their coats on. The waitress apologized for the cold and promised them that the place would heat up soon. "We're not long opened," she explained, and took their drinks order.

Maureen looked around at the tasteful orange walls and the candlelit tables. Behind the bright bar the waitress danced their drinks ready in a series of bunny dips and graceful swoops. "How did ye find this place?" she asked.

"I come here with Cammy." Leslie looked at the menu. "The goat cheese salad's nice."

"I'll have that, then," said Maureen, shutting the menu without reading it. She didn't want to eat, couldn't be arsed fighting with Leslie about it, and a cheese salad seemed as good a thing to leave as anything else.

"I think I'll have a steak," said Leslie. "Keep my strength up."

She smiled at Maureen, a weak and guilty smile, and Maureen thought she'd save her the bother of working around to it. "Why are we really here?" she asked.

"Well"-Leslie looked hopefully at the waitress but the drinks weren't ready-"it's not just for steak. It's Ann. See, her man said he didn't hit her and he didn't write to her, says he never lifted a finger."

"Leslie," said Maureen wearily, "what's the fucking deal with Ann? Will you just tell me?"

"He said he didn't hit her," repeated Leslie firmly.

They sat in silence until the waitress came over with their drinks on a rubberized tray. "Whiskey and lime for you," she said, placing the glass in front of Maureen, "and a vodka and soda for yourself."

Leslie took the drink and ordered their food. Maureen watched her make eye contact with the waitress and smile, fresh and open-faced. She hadn't seen her look like that for a long time. The waitress finished writing their order and backed off, leaving them alone together with the miles between them.

"Okay, so her man says he didn't hit her," said Maureen, trying to kill the fractious pause. "Suppose he's telling the truth? Could someone else have hit her? Maybe a boyfriend?"

Leslie looked incredulous. "Fucking hell, Maureen. The men never admit to hitting these women, but that doesn't mean they don't do it."

"No," said Maureen, feeling slighted, "but she'd hardly tell us a story that complicated, would she? She'd just say it was her man. If she had a boyfriend she could be with him now. Why didn't she bring her weans when she left?"

"Well, I don't know," Leslie said sarcastically. "Maybe running away with four kids is more complicated than running away alone."

And that one snide comment was enough. Maureen could be home in twenty minutes if she walked. "What are you in a fucking nippy mood with me for?" she said.

Leslie didn't answer.

"You're always in a fucking bad mood these days," continued Maureen. "Ye never want to see me or talk to me or do anything."

Leslie lit a fag and looked out of the window, her mouth slackening as if she was going to speak. Maureen took a mouthful of whiskey and sat back. She waited, only half expecting an answer. Leslie scratched her nose and looked over her shoulder for the waitress.

"I think the least we can do is go and ask her man about it. He lives in the big scheme," said Leslie, magnanimously letting Maureen's difficult mood go. "I'd go myself but if he was hanging about the office he might have seen me."

He could just as easily have seen Maureen at the office, but that didn't seem to have occurred to Leslie.